


still i see your face and wonder (were you once an outcast too?)

by thermodynamicActivity (chlorinetrifluoride)



Series: The Collegestuck 'Verse [21]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Middle School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Canon Disabled Character, Catholic School, Disfigurement, F/F, Humanstuck, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-19
Updated: 2017-07-19
Packaged: 2018-12-04 04:24:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11547423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chlorinetrifluoride/pseuds/thermodynamicActivity
Summary: Your name is Calliope, and today is your first day of seventh grade, and your first day back at a real school since your accident. You are... justifiably nervous. So nervous that you're still halfway considering being homeschooled for the rest of your life. However, you still have the same friends you've had since you were a small child, and most of them go to school with you. They are all, in their own way, willing and ready to protect you.And there's one more friend who may want to do something a little more than that? Perhaps? You smile when you think about her, but not too broadly. You're having sinful thoughts, and you're not sure how to feel about them.





	still i see your face and wonder (were you once an outcast too?)

**Author's Note:**

> shoutout to the 9 years i spent in catholic school, which enabled me to learn that Hell is an actual building with a zip code and cross streets.
> 
> additionally, this fic is something of a sequel to ["is it bright where you are? have the people changed?"](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11188590) so you should probably read that before you read this.
> 
> edit/post-script: this was going to be a one-shot originally.  
> i'm rapidly reconsidering that assessment.

_“Out there, they’ll revile you as a monster._  
_Out there, they will hate and scorn and jeer._  
_Why invite their calumny and consternation?_  
_Stay in here.”_  
\- The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, [Out There](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoFqnoebywo)

* * *

  ** _September 2005 - Calliope Calver_**

 

At five-thirty in the morning, freshly showered, you retch into the toilet. but bring nothing up besides bile. It’s the third time you’ve vomited since you woke up an hour ago.

You’re not sick or anything, unless your crippling sense of impending doom counts as a sickness. But it’s your first day of seventh grade. It’s your first day going to real,  _actual_ school in almost five months.

Hands gripping the edges of your bathroom sink, you lean forward and gaze at your reflection. Awful as it is, you’ve grown accustomed to it. Certainly, you’ve spent enough nights saying every prayer you know, your eyes leveled at the ceiling, begging God to make you look normal again, to no avail, to become resigned to your fate.

But your classmates have not. Out of you graduating class of 28 students, only Eridan and Terezi have seen you without your little green scarf. And Terezi couldn’t see you much either way, so…

That brings it down to Eridan.

You put on your school uniform slowly, and leave the gauzy lime green scarf for last.

Last week, Aradia gave you a half dozen long pins - special ones for keeping fabric in place, the sort she uses for her headscarf - and showed you an easy way to pin the green material around your face to hide the majority of your burns.

_(You tried to give the pins back, insisting you didn’t want to inconvenience her, and she told you not to worry, ‘cause she had a million of them._

_“I keep forgetting where I put mine, then Damara buys me another set, then I find the old set, and now my dresser’s covered in them.”)_

You’d made an attempt at covering your face before you asked for her help, but she made everything hang in a neat way it hadn’t before.

“It looks rather stylish,” she commented. 

You’d agreed.

It looked better than you dared hope it would.

“You’ll be fine at school,” Aradia said, soothingly.

Now you don’t know about that.

School doesn’t start until 8:05, but the sound of your parents arguing downstairs awoke you quite a few hours before you actually needed to be up. It was the same argument they’ve had several times a week ever since your father announced that he’d enrolled you in 7th grade at your old school.

Your mother didn’t want to see you ridiculed by your fellow students. Perhaps a few more surgeries might improve your appearance. And then, you could return to school.

Your father insisted that unless she planned to keep you hidden away for the rest of your life, you’d need to go back to class, and be among people your own age, at some point. The longer this was delayed, the less you’d be able to function in a normal classroom.

He won in the end.

And you haltingly agreed with him.

As much as you didn’t want people to gawk at you as if at a circus sideshow, you wanted to stay essentially imprisoned in your room even less.

Once you’re dressed, your grown-out bangs concealing almost all the remaining burns your scarf could not, you retreat to your safe place. The upstairs closet.

It locks from the inside, as if the architect of your house had been able to anticipate your plight from several decades in the past. When Caliborn occasionally got angry enough to strike you, to punch you, to kick you, you’d make a mad dash for it.

You sit among the uniform blouses, blazers, and other clothes, shivering, even though it has to be nearly eighty degrees in here.

You put your head against the cool wood of the door and begin to doze again.

At 7:10 - according to the clock on your little flip-phone -  you hear your father calling your name.

“Callie, dear? Come downstairs,” he says. “You should probably eat your breakfast and start walking if you want to be there before the first bell.”

“Yes, papa,“ you call back.

You emerge from the closet, slightly sweaty, but otherwise ready for school. You take your usual seat at the kitchen table, except everything is off balance, now. There are four chairs at this round table. There are three people sitting at it.

Caliborn, who would ordinarily be seated across from you, is far upstate, in that institution your parents sent him to, after he set you on fire.

“And you’re  _certain_  you want to go to school, love?” your mother asks, tossing the dark braid of her hair back, and piling eggs onto your plate. “It’s not too late for you to withdraw. You can be homeschooled for the time being. You can stay right here, and nobody will ridicule you.”

You’d always assumed your mother’s hesitance to send you back to a regular school was born from a desire to keep your safe. But after one overheard late-night argument between her and your father, and the insinuations he made, showed you a different possible set of writing on the wall.

Your mother is heavily involved in the parish affiliated with the Catholic school you’ve attended since Kindergarten. She cleans the church, she goes there every morning to say the Rosary, to attend morning Mass, and more besides. It’s disgraceful enough that her son ended up institutionalized, without her daughter’s scars, trauma, and timidity on display to everyone.

You like to think that your mother is trying to protect you. But also you know how obsessed she is with appearances. You can’t decide what her real motivations are. The scales never tip one way for long.

Meanwhile, your father is too mild-mannered to ever raise a real word of disagreement to her in front of you. Even his facial expression stays essentially neutral.

But you know him better than that. He cuts his toast into quarters with a certain vehemence he does not usually possess.

You push your breakfast around on the lilac patterned plate for about ten minutes, before you lower your scarf again, to declare that you’re not hungry.

“Might as well get going now, so I know where the seventh graders are supposed to stand,” you say. You hug your father, and peck your mother on the cheek. “I’ll call you if anything happens?”

“Please do,” your father says. “Would you like me to drive you to school?”

“No, no, it’s fine.” You put on your navy-blue blazer and straighten your skirt. “Eridan’s walking me, anyway.”

Your mother does not look entirely satisfied.

“Give Eridan my regards,” your father says.

He thinks for a moment and tells you to wait. He goes back into the kitchen, puts a heap of eggs, bacon and toast onto a paper plate, wraps it in foil, along with a fork, and hands it to you.

“Give that to him, as well. God knows that boy should eat more than he does.”

Your father has been surreptitiously supplying Eridan with whatever meals he could, ever since he found out that his parents were abroad so often that he was almost solely supervised by his irresponsible teenaged brother. At least this much has stayed the same.

Eridan’s leaning against your picket fence, affecting a devil may care attitude, and smoking a cigarette he no doubt stole from Cronus by the time you get outside.

You hand him the wrapped breakfast.

“Papa made you a plate,” you say. “But when you’re done eating, I’ll probably need the fork back.”

“Callie, your dad is the best.”

You agree.

You wrinkle your nose at the acrid smell of the smoke. Bad enough that the odor of cigarettes has seeped into his clothes and most of the porous objects in his house, due to Cronus’s propensity for smoking indoors (and everywhere else).

But now Eridan’s actually smoking the damn things too?

You forget to be nervous about everything, in the wake of your best friend’s poor choices.

“Is this quite necessary?” you ask, lowering your scarf again, so your voice isn’t muffled by it.

“This is  _seventh grade_. I gotta look cool, man. We’re almost in high school, y’know,” Eridan says. “Sides. Vriska smokes them.”

You don’t dare point out that Vriska is beyond all comprehension, because thinking of Vriska makes you think of your brother.

The pair of them used to utilize a magnifying glass to immolate ants on the playground. One time, they managed to set fire to a butterfly, and instead of feeling sick - the way you did, watching them - Vriska declared it the greatest feat they’d managed all day.

You feel just as ill as you did that day, vertiginous, on the verge of fainting. They’re all going to laugh at you. They’re going to point you out as an Other. They’re going to ostracize you. They’re going to hate you. 

Your mother was right.

Your mother was right.

“Calliope,” Eridan says through a mouthful of smoke. “Callie, breathe. In for three, out for five.”

The closer you get to school, the slower you walk, as if your legs have been submerged in quick drying concrete. Eridan takes you by the hand, and flicks a lock of your bangs.

“Callie,” he repeats. He stubs out his cigarette on the ground and puffs out his chest. “I’ll protect you. I won’t let anything happen to you. Neither will Tav, or Rezi, or anyone else.”

By then, you’re around the corner from school, able to see the students lined up on the path to the front doors. You recognize a few faces in the crowd, and realize where you are meant to line up, being in seventh grade.

Eridan takes your hand.

You let out a sound between a sigh and a sob, and grab his hand for dear life. If you’re turning his fingers purple in your vice-like grip, he doesn’t complain. He leads you forward, and you halfway close your eyes. It’s easier if all the figures are blurry. It’s easier if you don’t have to see individual faces. You follow his steps until he stops.

You hear your name again, among other things, as you reach your classmates. You hear it a few times, as students murmur the name of the strange girl with the bowed head and the scarf covering the lower half of her face.

_“Calliope?”_

_“Calliope Calver?”_

_“Are you sure it’s her?”_

_“Didn’t she get set on fire?”_

_“Look at that blonde hair. It’s gotta be her.”_

The cacophony of the soft repetition, along with the fabric rustle of school uniforms against each other - plaid skirts or grey trousers - depending on gender - heavy blouses, fully buttoned blazers, and ties, even at the start of September - sounds to you vaguely like the loud whisper of a flock of birds taking off for the sky.

You wish you could be among their hypothetical number.

“Calliope!” you hear a male voice that is not Eridan’s exclaim. You chance opening your eyes. It’s Tavros, his blazer tied ‘round his waist, his shirt partially untucked. “You’re actually here!”

His grin issues so wide and sincere that you can’t help but smile back, although he cannot see your mouth through your scarf. You enunciate loudly, and clearly, so he can hear you through the ambient chatter.

“I’m here,” you repeat.

You stand as straight and poised as you would if Sister Constance were standing directly behind you to correct your posture.

“I smell green apples,” Terezi says, elbowing her way to the back of the 7th grade boys’ line, to stand beside Tavros. She reaches out to put her hands on your head - aside from their voices, she can tell her friends by the texture and cut of their hair -  and gives you a toothy grin. “So it really is you, then.”

“It is,” you say, softly now, moving to stand at the back of the girls’ line. “I came back.”

“Good, ‘cause seventh grade would be a drag without you around. End of sixth was bad enough,” she says. She lowers her voice, and offers you a grin. “You’re a lot braver than I would have been. Then again, why should I have expected anything less?”

You blush at such words of high praise.

Even Vriska comes over to properly ascertain that it’s you. She doesn’t say anything immediately.

“You came back,” she finally says, her breath reeking of tobacco. In a lower voice, she says, “Good for you.”

Then, she and Eridan fight over who owes whom cigarettes based upon the end-of-summer poker tournaments in 132nd Street Park, and who should pay up at the end of the day.

Vaguely listening to that argument carries you all the way to the first bell.

“You’re impaired in your left eye, aren’t you?” Terezi asks then, not to judge, just to confirm.

You nod, and then remember she cannot see that gesture.

“Yes,” you say, lowering your scarf for a bare fraction of a second so she can hear you.

“Well, we have Sister Constance for homeroom, and that’s on the first floor. Take my arm. I’ll make sure you don’t fall down. Just stick by us.”

Tavros takes your other arm.

You don’t deserve such kindness. You are an anomaly masquerading as a seventh grader. Your heart flutters in your chest, stuck somewhere between acting like a hummingbird and acting like a jackhammer.

“They’ve got you, Callie,” Eridan says, bringing up the rear, his chin near your shoulder. “Don’t worry.”

You don’t see how you couldn’t.

You feel hyper-aware of everything, so overwhelmed around that you close your eyes. You wait for Caliborn to jeer loudly, trip you, and send you sprawling. You can almost feel his presence in the building. 

But he’s not here.

_He’s not here! He can’t hurt you!_

You allow yourself a soft smile at the revelation.  

Still, you can’t handle all of this sensory input. Not after spending five months in your room, where you could control every little thing you encountered. The hands guiding you. The voices beside, behind, and in front of you. The smell of Pine-Sol, pencils, and chalk in the hallways. The brush of your skirt against your stockings.

You open your eyes a bit.

You enter Sister Constance’s room, and Tavros guides you to your assigned seat, right beside his. You’re both in the middle of the front row, as is Terezi, all the way at the right-hand end.

“You’re going to be okay, Callie,” Tavros says.

He asks Sister Constance if he and Terezi can switch seats, so she’ll be able to see what little she can see, and hear the discussion perfectly.

“I don’t see why not,” she replies.

The two of them perform that switch.

Then, Sister Constance, the oldest educator in the school, and the only remaining nun who teaches anything besides Religion (she also teaches Math), calls attendance. 

Instead of saying “Present!” at Calver, Calliope, you raise your hand, unable to verbalize. She marks you present just the same.

Once she’s done with attendance, she jumps into her beginning of the year speech.

“This will be one of the most significant years of education you’ll experience at this school,” she begins. “Does anyone know why?”

You don’t. Or if you do, you cannot articulate it, because your mind has grayed out with the thought of having to survive an entire day of school before you can retreat to your little closet, shut your eyes, and recover from your sensory overload.

But, apparently, someone else does.

“Terezi?” Sister Constance asks.

“All our potential high schools are gonna - excuse my diction - they are going to see our seventh grade marks when we apply for admission. So they count the most.”

“You raise a valid point, Miss Pyrope,” Sister Constance replies. “However, there is a less secular, academic reason behind the importance of this year. Would anyone care to hazard a guess to it?”

A pause.

She calls on another.

“Confirmation,” Tavros answers.

“Precisely. The sacrament of Confirmation,” Sister Constance says. She nearly word-for-word quotes the Catechism then, and only your years of study as an altar server and a devout Catholic in general clue you into this. “In May, you will receive the spiritual seal, the spirit of wisdom and understanding and courage, the spirit of right judgment and courage, the spirit of knowledge and reverence, the spirit of holy fear in God’s presence. God our Father will mark you with his sign; Christ the Lord will confirm you and place his pledge, the Spirit, in your heart.”

She waits a moment or two for this proclamation to fully sink in.

“In other words, you will become  _fully_  fledged members of the Catholic Church,” she continues. “Baptism and First Communion have been preparations for you to receive this sacrament. It is not to be taken lightly, and your Religion classes this year will prepare you for this gift.”

Another pause, long enough for someone to raise their hand.

“Miss Serket?” Sister Constance asks.

“What if we really mess up, and we don’t get confirmed?” she asks. “Do we get excommunicated or something?”

“If you almost dropped the Bishop’s staff last year, during mass, there’s probably nothing worse they could excommunicate you for,” Eridan mutters, not far away from you.

Sister Constance assures all of you that nobody is getting excommunicated, and wonders aloud where any of you got such ridiculous ideas about a punishment as grave as that. The Church doesn’t go around excommunicating children.

You look over at Terezi Pyrope, who leans forward, the tips of her straight hair barely skimming her shoulders, and rests her head on her hands, her pointy elbows on the desk. 

The way she carries herself as if she needs no one, as if even her cane were an accoutrement instead of an integral means of assistance. Your heart flutters in your chest again.

You recall Eridan telling you about how he nearly kissed Tavros in January.

And you wonder what it would be like to kiss Terezi. If her breath would smell like the peppermint gum she chews all the time, unless a teacher makes her spit it out. You wonder if she would kiss back. 

Certainly she hovered often enough in your face in August, telling you that you could be stronger than you thought you could be, reminding you of the time in Kindergarten where you told her that her blindness did not make her inferior to the rest of you (although you were not nearly so articulate at the age of five).

Then, you wonder if you could be excommunicated for  _that_ particular thought. Worst of all, you wonder if you’d actually mind all that much, as long as Terezi kissed back. Your cheeks flush, and you focus on your math notebook for the rest of the double period, suddenly scared that Sister Constance and your classmates can read your mind.

When the bell rings to signal that all of you should make your way to Mrs. Vandrenti’s Language Arts class on the third floor, you’re thankful. At least until Terezi grabs your arm again. Aside from being mildly startled, you are doing your level best not to blush around her.

“Do you need my help?” she asks in a low voice. “I’m not trying to patronize you, okay? If you don’t, you don’t have to take it.”

Patronize. That’s a 9th grade level word at the very least.

“Please,” you say. “I could use the extra confidence.”

This time, Tavros does not take your other arm. You let Terezi lead you up the winding staircase to room 301. Although Vandrenti is the strictest teacher you’ve ever met, she actually lets you choose your seats. Terezi takes the seat at your left-hand side - just as well, since you’re left-handed - and Vriska beside her. Eridan takes the other seat next to you.

Ms. Vandrenti taps her foot on the floor expectantly, long after everyone has filed into her classroom.

“Do all of you know the significance of the uniform?” she finally asks.

You can sense by her tone that this is a rhetorical question. So does everyone else.

“It is a method of reminding all of you that you are equal in the eyes of those who matter.” In the eyes of the faculty, and, more importantly, the eyes of God, she seems to be insinuating. “Yet, one of you feels exempt from these standards.”

A longer silence that seems to stretch into infinity ensues.

“Miss Calver, I was not aware that a scarf was part of your uniform. In September, no less.”

At least four students jump to your defense, but she is not placated. The chorusing voices insisting on special circumstances do nothing to change her mind.

“Rules are rules,” she says.

She crosses her arms over her chest.

You know what you have to do. And you’ll do it. You’ll be brave. You’ll be strong.

You need to open your eyes fully. Then, you need to take off the scarf.

You unwind it, your eyes focused slightly above her head, even as your vision blurs with tears. You deposit it on the desk in front of you. You gaze around.

You do not miss the students who stare at you with eyes wide as crackers, nor the ones who say variations on “Oh my gosh”, and “What the–?”. Nor do you miss the several people who inch their desks away from you.

“I apologize,” you say to Mrs. Vandrenti.. “I did not mean to disobey you.”

“Isn’t this better, then, Miss Calver?” she asks.

You do not answer. You cannot answer. You’ve gone nonverbal again. It’s as if your brother’s sadism has surfaced long enough to possess this one woman, reminding you that there is no escape from what has happened to you.

You stand, swaying, taking in the room of seventh graders in its entirety.

And oh, oh, no.

So many of them are gawking. So many of them stare at you like the abomination you are. So many of them are burning holes in your tenuous sense of confidence, their eyes cruel, not curious.

 _“It looks like part of her face melted,”_  someone comments. Mrs. Vandrenti admonishes them, but not soon enough.

You recall Jesus on the cross in Sister Constance’s room, the Stigmata. You think you’d rather be crucified than endure this. Jesus took three hours to die. But at least they finally let him die.

As for you, Calliope? This is only your first day of school. You have a hundred and seventy nine more days of it to survive, and that’s just for the seventh grade. 

You should have done as your mother suggested. Sequestered yourself in your bedroom like a nun. At least you’d be free from prying eyes.

Without asking for permission, you flee the room as fast as your feet will carry you. You stumble down the hall, to the doors to a stairwell, and take the steps toward the back exit two at a time, only stopping when your legs give out on the second landing and leave you slumped there, still trying to drag yourself further away from the third floor.

If you could just get your traitorous legs to support you…

You hear someone murmur “this isn’t fair”, and footsteps grow closer. You shrink away from the sound. You left your scarf in Ms. Vandrenti’s room, so you cover your face with your hands, and shut your eyes as tight as they’ll go.

“Calliope?” a female voice asks.

Unbidden tears run down your face.

“Please don’t laugh at me,” you say. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I look so awful.”

Someone sits down next to you, their butt making a “thump” against the tile floor. Tender hands grasp your shoulders.

“You have nothing to apologize for.”

That same person kisses your left eyelid. You chance a look at what might lay in front of you. It’s Terezi, the light from the window of the landing throwing her features into stark relief.

“Why are you here?” you ask.

She stares at you as if she doesn’t understand the question.

“You’re my friend, Callie. And you don’t deserve any of this.”

She doesn’t tell you that she’d noticed the ruler-straight scars on your right arm a few weeks back, but she doesn’t have to. Last time you saw her, you were wearing a tank top, and she ran her fingers down your arms, pausing when she felt the raised tissue. But she didn’t say anything about them.

Her hands find their way from your shoulders to your hands, skimming the fabric of your blazer. She squeezes your hands once, and lets them drop.

“This is awful,” you say, unable to keep your voice even any longer.

Terezi gives you your scarf back, enfolds you in a one-armed embrace, and lets you cry into her shoulder until you’re all cried out.

“I should have never come back,” you whisper. “I’m going home after this.”

“No,” Terezi says, shaking her head. “You leave here, and Caliborn wins. He’s terrorized you into not only locking yourself in your own jail, but throwing away the key. So you have to stay. And you have to fight.”

“Do I, really?”

“Vandrenti, she knows she went too far. I have a cane. That’s not part of the uniform. But does that violate the rules?”

“I suppose not.”

“It’s not much, but just keep in mind that she’s in the wrong, and you’re not,” Terezi says. “Remember Kindergarten? Remember how you defended me?”

“I do.” 

“So we have an understanding, then,” Terezi says, grinning her toothy smile. “Anyone who wants to be horrible to you is going to have to go through me, first.”

She runs one warm finger down your cheek. Without thinking, you break into a genuine smile, gazing at Terezi without your scarf, without fear. 

With one hand, she tips your face up so that your mouths are nearly aligned. You lean in toward her, inhaling the scent of peppermint gum.

Then, more cacophony in the landing above, startling you two apart. At least three people are in the stairwell.

“Eridan, you heard Vandrenti,” Vriska protests. “You’re gonna get us all detention until January.”

“I would gladly take detention in order to make sure Calliope was okay,” Tavros says.

“You haven’t spent a day of detention in your life,” Eridan shoots back.

“Except when I got busted playing Pokemon during first Friday Mass.”

“Yeah, well, that was your own fault.”

“Fucking detention,” Vriska says.

“Vris, don’t front like you aren’t already gonna end up in detention until next year either way,” Eridan says. “You called Vandrenti - I quote - _a goddamn tyrant._ Fuck, you might get suspended  _and_  excommunicated in the same day.”

Terezi snorts. You shake your head in disbelief that Vriska went that far, but really, why should that surprise you?

“Well, she is a goddamn tyrant! And if everything’s equal, she’s got more to worry than that, too!” Vriska says. “I bet money there’s a place in Hell for the pious, sanctimonious, but completely evil. No way did God miss that loophole.”

“I um, would hope not,” Tavros says. “That would be a stunning lapse of judgment on His part.”

They walk down the steps to your landing, all of them looking relieved to see you when they do. 

Eridan gives you a hug so tight that he may have sprained one or two of your ribs in the process. Vriska and Tavros maintain their distance, but seem no less pleased.

You sigh.

“All of you should really go back to Vandrenti’s class,” you tell them, including Terezi.

“And what’re you going to do?” Eridan asks.

You think for a while.

“I think…” you begin a timid voice. You stand, your posture perfect again. “I think I’m going to walk over to the church and pray in front of the statue of the Virgin Mary for a while.”

Vriska mutters something derisive about pious altar servers until Terezi stomps on her foot. Eridan, knowing you the way he knows you, knows he won’t change your mind. Tavros follows their lead.

“Take someone with you, then,” Eridan says. “And remember what time Vandrenti’s class is over so you don’t miss any more school.”

“Way ahead of you, Mister Hyacinth,” Terezi says.  _“I’ll_ go with her.”

“You’re going to voluntarily cut class?” Vriska asks Terezi, gobsmacked.

“I already know how to write better than all of you combined, and I already know what injustice looks like when it’s practiced on those who cannot object,” Terezi says, not really bragging about the first thing, just stating it as a matter of fact. “I’d wager that there is not a thing Vandrenti can teach me.”

“What about your grades?” you ask.

“I have an IEP,” Terezi says. “If Vandrenti wants to fail me out of spite, or even give me detention more than month, she’s going to have to face  _my parents._ And the law.”

In the end, it’s you and Terezi who leave out the back exit, your left hand intertwined with her right one. She folds a piece of looseleaf at least five times, until it’s become a small but fairly thick square. This, she uses to prop the door open ever-so-slightly, so you can get back in later.

“Vriska showed me this trick,” she says. “It’s how she always manages to leave school and go to the pizzeria during lunch. You should come with us, next time.”

You shrug, neither saying yes nor saying no. “Maybe?”

Terezi’s skirt, the longest out of all the girls in your grade - being that it’s actually below the knee, the way it’s supposed to be - swishes as she walks, mesmerizing you.

Probably not intentionally.

You decide to look elsewhere, to keep you from your sinful thoughts.

“Maybe you should get an IEP,” she suggests, half a minute later. “Certain mental conditions qualify for special considerations in that direction.”

Your heart sinks.

“Are you saying that I’m mental?”

She kisses your cheek, and shakes her head.

“I’m saying that anyone would be a little mental if they’d gone through what you have,” she says. “Depending on what a doctor says, you could get extra time on tests. You could get alternate assignments. You’d be able to leave class without asking permission first, if you were feeling overwhelmed for whatever reason. It’s something to think about.”

“I guess I’ll think about it, then.”

You’ve nearly traveled in a complete circle by the time you reach the outside of the church, and the level plane of grass, with a seven foot, white marble statue of the Virgin Mother set at its center. You know you’re disturbing what must be carefully manicured grass, but you take the lightest steps as you can, Terezi not far behind.

You take out the crystal rosary you received the day of your First Communion, and fall to your knees.

All these years later, and you still have it, the beads burnished to an almost brand-new shine. You don’t think you’ll say the whole Rosary; that would take too long. Terezi takes out a rosary made of brown beads, one she received from her abuelito before he died, she explains.

You keep your rosaries out, even after you’ve decided there isn’t enough time to say all of it.

“Terezi, if you kneel, you might get grass stains,” you say to her.

“If I’m not mistaken, one of the prominent colors in our skirts is green,” Terezi says. “And my stockings are black, so I think I’m good there.”

She kneels down beside you.

You take some time to take in the sight of the Virgin Mary, the accepting smile on Her face, the blank yet expansive range of Her marble stare. If you remember the gospels correctly, Mary was not much older than you and Terezi when She ended up conceiving Christ.

And then…? After all that hardship, to ultimately outlive Him? To watch Her son die for speaking the truth? You’ve always admired Her the most.

You wonder if She would be kind to you. If She would stare at your scars avidly. God is a god of of love, though. Surely She must be even more so, as the mother of God.

 _“Hail Holy Queen, mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness, and our hope,”_  you begin.

 _“To you do we cry, poor banished children of Eve…”_ Terezi goes on.

You two continue to pray, your voices issuing in unison.

_“…turn then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us…”_

You take Terezi’s hand again.

_“…O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary. Pray for us, O holy mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.”_

Once you’re done with that, you let out your own silent prayer, thanking God for the likes of Terezi, Eridan, Tavros, Aradia, and, yes, even Vriska.

Terezi helps you up, and you two return to the back entrance to the school, where her piece of looseleaf has held up. She pumps a victorious fist into the air.

You two stand there in close proximity, facing each other, in the darkened landing. You could cut the tension between you with a knife.

Then, without warning, Terezi kisses you full on on the mouth, taking your chin between her thumb and forefinger. 

You lean into her and do your best to return the gesture, holding onto one of her shoulders to keep you balanced, even as your head spins and warmth blooms in your chest. She tugs you forward by your navy-blue tie and kisses you again.

_(This is a sin. Homosexuality is a sin._

_You can't be bothered to feel properly contrite at the moment.)_

When you pull away, the faintest taste of peppermint gum lingers on your lips. She pops another stick into her mouth, almost reflexively. Color high, she grins at you once more.

She puts her index finger to her lips in a “shhh”ing gesture. Well, obviously, you’re not going to tell anyone what just happened. Maybe not even Eridan.

“I really am so glad that you came back,” she says to you. 

“I know,” you reply. “I think… I think I’m glad, too. More glad than I was before.”

She nods, understanding.

“So. Uh. Wanna come over after school?” she asks.

“Certainly.” You will yourself to stop blushing. “You and Latula can teach me how to play that game.”

“Which game?”

“The one with the music?”

“You’re being awfully specific, here,” Terezi says, trying not to laugh.

“The one with the plastic guitar.”

“Oh! Guitar hero?” she asks. “Sounds good to me. Latula’s gonna kick our asses, though.”

“When doesn’t she?”

Vandrenti has a field day giving out detentions after you two return. Vriska’s going to be in detention until the end of recorded history and then some, Eridan’s going to be in detention until December, Tavros is going to be in detention until November, and you and Terezi are going to be there until the end of October. 

All of your parents are getting notified.

“I would expect something like this from Eridan or Vriska,” Mrs. Vandrenti starts out, glaring at you and Terezi. “But you two? You two, of all people?”

An hour later, in Science, Terezi grins at you from across the room. During lunch, under the table, she takes your hand.

Your mother is going to die of embarrassment that her daughter has ended up with detention on the first day of school. She’s going to lecture you until you expire of old age, when you finally go home.

 _Worth it,_  you think, smiling down at your meatloaf the way no one has ever smiled at meatloaf.

_Absolutely worth it._

 


End file.
